ndoo dancer.

Everyone went more or less mad.

They left about four in the morning, all rather drunk, if one must write
it. But the more I had drunk the more hideously sober and filled with
anguish I seemed to become, until when I had called the last cheery
good-night and was at last alone in my bed, I felt as if the end had
come, and that death would be the next and only good thing which could
happen to me.

I have never before had this strange detached sense in such measure as
this night. As of a hungry agonized spirit standing outside its wretched
body, and watching its feeble movements, conscious of their futility,
conscious of being chained to the miserable thing, and only knowing
rebellion and agony.

Burton gave me a sleeping draught, and I slept far into the next day to
awake more unhappy than ever, obsessed with self-contempt and
degradation.

In the afternoon, I received a note from Maurice, telling me that he had
inadvertently heard that a fellow in the American Red Cross had seen
Miss Sharp's passport, when she had been sent down to Brest for them,
and the name on it was Alathea Bulteel Sharp, and judging that the
second name sounded as if it might be a well-known English one, he
hastened to tell me, in case it should be a clue. I could not think
where I had heard it before, or with what memory it was connecting in my
brain. I had a feeling it was something to do with George Harcourt. I
puzzled for a while, and then I looked back over the pages of my
journal, and there found what I had written of his conversation--Bobby
Bulteel--Hartelford's brother--cheating at cards--and married to Lady
Hilda Marchant----

Of course!--The whole thing became plain to me! This would account for
everything. I hobbled up and got down the peerage. I turned to the
Hartelford title, and noted the brothers--the Hon'bles--John Sinclair,
Charles Henry, and Robert Edgar. This last must be "Bobby" Then I read
the usual things--"Educated at Eton and Christchurch, etc., etc." "Left
the Guards in 1893." "Married in 1894--Lady Hilda Farwell, only daughter
of the Marquess of Braxted (title extinct) and divorced wife of William
Marchant, Esquire." "Issue--"

"Alathea--born 1894, John Robert born 1905, and Hilda born 1907."

So the whole tragic story seemed to unfold itself before me.

Alathea is the child of that great love and sacrifice of her Mother--I
read again the words George had used: "She adored the fellow who had
every